Using Raspberry Pi for Gridseed ASIC Mining Controller

30Mar 2014

We just got our Raspberry Pi and we are about to start testing the few already available mining images for the device that help you get started in using it for a Gridseed ASIC mining controller. You can of course start with a normal distribution and compile the miner yourself and set things up to run with the Raspberry Pi, however this requires some extra knowledge and time and not anybody can do it. On the other hand you have readily available images that you just need to write on and SD card and run them on the Raspberry Pi and supposedly you just need to configure the pool settings and you will be up and running in no time. Could it be that easy, or you should expect to have some troubles, we are going to find out soon enough. For now we’ll list the Gridseed optimized images that we could find available to use on Raspberry Pi, so you might want to give them a try as well…

Scripta is a Litecoin mining distribution for Raspberry Pi that provides a web interface for easier controlling, configuring and monitoring your mining devices. Originally it does not support Gridseed devices, but by replacing the supplied cgminer with a one supporting Gridseed ASICs you can easily make it work with Gridseed devices as well. In fact we suspect that most of the other images available below are based on Scripta based on some screenshots we’ve seen even though we still haven’t started testing any of them.

MinerEU does provide a dedicated Raspberry Pi image for Gridseed usb miner to their customers only. The image is now freely available, so you can download it and try it out if you are interested. We are going to give it a try for sure.

Hash Master apparently does provide their Raspberry Pi image along with the device if you purchase the complete controller package from them. We could not find their Pi image available for download other then the complete package they offer as a Pi-based controller with SD card and preloaded image on it, so we are not going to be able to test this image, but it seems to be pretty much Scripta with some visual modifications and the proper cgminer for Gridseed.

Zoom Hash does not give out much information about their image or even screenshots, but has a short guide and instructions for installing the image along with a download link available for everyone. We are going to be trying their image for the Raspberry Pi.

Hashra also does provide an image with some instructions to setup and use the Raspberry Pi as a controller for Gridseed ASIC devices. They do not sell RPi separately, but include it with their 20 miners package as a controller for the ASIC devices. They call their software for RPi Hashra Controla and it has web-based interface available.

This is it for now, time for testing the images. If you know about another Raspberry Pi image for Gridseed ASIC miners please feel free to share information about it so that we can include it in the list and also test it along with the others.

8 Responses to Using Raspberry Pi for Gridseed ASIC Mining Controller

something to know about mining with raspberry, something that drove me crazy for 3 days trying to debug and understand kernel crashes on a [disabled logging] raspbian image (as it should, log diabled and swap file disabled].

First, there are multiple distro around to mine. do not forget to check those two things: log must be disabled and swap file not on the sd (or disabled). google it, it’s plenty of knowledge, the point is that excessive writes/reads on the sd will destroy it soon.

Second, gcminer 3.7.2 generates heavy memory corruptions, kernels detect them, gets into oops, then panic with no reboot… in results, your system will hang with no reasons after 20-60 or even 90 minutes. check you monitor console to see the crash logged on. on top as you disabled all logging, there is no way to track what happened at the reboot.

This time is not matter of powersupply or other stuff, it’s really a memory corruption issues. after spending hours on this issue, I discovered that there is parameter to instruct the kernel to be more “tolerant” … my r pi is running now since 48h, stable with no issues. you are not solving the root cause but you are istructiing the rasp to be more tolerant by issuing slug_debug at cmdline.txt on the boot partition.

follow this article, add the parameter and don’t forget to don’t append the parameter on thesame line, do not CR for a new line…

please remove my other comments as the html is messed up.
hash master does provide their firmware.
at the bottom thir page, in the footer, look for the following text “rpi”.
this will take you to the firmware page for it. (the final page is here hash-master.com/rpi
also minepeon is compatible with them if you follow this guide[SOLVED] Minepeon 2.4.6 and dualminer (scrypt only)

It would be really nice to get at least a confirmation email from your company regarding my order. Two attempts to communicate (1-comment form on website and 2- email to sales@hashmaster) and have received no reply. Your website shows incorrect information regarding my order #5337. If product is not available or there is some problem with seeing my payment then at least contact me.

i just found out and started messing with another distro. its called Minera
and i have to say im impressed with the UI and believe i will never look back to scripta againMinera @ bitcoin talk
it runs flawlessly with gridseeds and you can set the frequency to anything from 600 to 1400 (it uses a drop down list for this)
my gridseed is running @ 900 with no hardware errors

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